It was an evasive opinion (encumbered with hard words of Greek and Roman origin) when it was at last pronounced. I waited until they had taken their leave, and then appealed to my own doctor. "What do these men really think?" I asked. "Shall I live, or die?"
The doctor answered for himself as well as for his illustrious colleagues. "We have great faith in the new prescriptions," he said.
I understood what that meant. They were afraid to tell me the truth. I insisted on the truth.
"How long shall I live?" I said. "Till the end of the year?"
The reply followed in one terrible word:
"Perhaps."
It was then the first week in December. I understood that I might reckon--at the utmost--on three weeks of life. What I felt, on arriving at this conclusion, I shall not say. It is the one secret I keep from the readers of these lines.
The next day, Mrs. Rymer called once more to make inquiries. Not satisfied with the servant's report, she entreated that I would consent to see her. My housekeeper, with her customary kindness, undertook to convey the message. If she had been a wicked woman, would she have acted in this way? "Mrs. Rymer seems to be sadly distressed," she pleaded. "As I understand, sir, she is suffering under some domestic anxiety which can only be mentioned to yourself."
Did this anxiety relate to Susan? The bare doubt of it decided me. I consented to see Mrs. Rymer. Feeling it necessary to control her in the use of her tongue, I spoke the moment the door was opened.
"I am suffering from illness; and I must ask you to spare me as much as possible. What do you wish to say to me?"
The tone in which I addressed Mrs. Rymer would have offended a more sensitive woman. The truth is, she had chosen an unfortunate time for her visit. There were fluctuations in the progress of my malady; there were days when I felt better, and days when I felt worse--and this was a bad day. Moreover, my uncle had tried my temper that morning. He had called to see me, on his way to winter in the south of France by his physician's advice; and he recommended a trial of change of air in my case also. His country house (only thirty miles from London) was entirely at my disposal; and the railway supplied beds for invalids. It was useless to answer that I was not equal to the effort. He reminded me that I had exerted myself to leave my bedchamber for my arm-chair in the next room, and that a little additional resolution would enable me to follow his advice. We parted in a state of irritation on either side which, so far as I was concerned, had not subsided yet.
"I wish to speak to you, sir, about my daughter," Mrs. Rymer answered.
The mere allusion to Susan had its composing effect on me. I said kindly that I hoped she was well.
"Well in body," Mrs. Rymer announced. "Far from it, sir, in mind."
Before I could ask what this meant, we were interrupted by the appearance of the servant, bringing the letters which had arrived for me by the afternoon post. I told the man, impatiently, to put them on the table at my side.
"What is distressing Susan?" I inquired, without stopping to look at the letters.
"She is fretting, sir, about your illness. Oh, Mr. Lepel, if you would only try the sweet country air! If you only had my good little Susan to nurse you!"
She, too, taking my uncle's view! And talking of Susan as my nurse!
"What are you thinking of?" I asked her. "A young girl like your daughter nursing Me! You ought to have more regard for Susan's good name!"
"I know what you ought to do!" She made that strange reply with a furtive look at me, half in anger, half in alarm.
"Go on," I said.
"Will you turn me out of your house for my impudence?" she asked.
"I will hear what you have to say to me. What ought I to do?"
"Marry Susan."
I heard the woman plainly--and yet, I declare, I doubted the evidence of my senses.
"She's breaking her heart for you," Mrs. Rymer burst out. "She's been in love with you since you first darkened our doors--and it will end in the neighbors finding it out. I did my duty to her; I tried to stop it; I tried to prevent you from seeing her, when you went away. Too late; the mischief was done. When I see my girl fading day by day--crying about you in secret, talking about you in her dreams--I can't stand it; I must speak out. Oh, yes, I know how far beneath you she is--the daughter of your uncle's servant. But she's your equal, sir, in the sight of Heaven. My lord's priest converted her only last year--and my Susan is as good a Papist as yourself."
How could I let this go on? I felt that I ought to have stopped it before.
"It's possible," I said, "that you may not be deliberately deceiving me. If you are yourself deceived, I am bound to tell you the truth. Mr. Rothsay loves your daughter, and, what is more, Mr. Rothsay has reason to know that Susan--"
"That Susan loves him?" she interposed, with a mocking laugh. "Oh, Mr. Lepel, is it possible that a clever man like you can't see clearer than that? My girl in love with Mr. Rothsay! She wouldn't have looked at him a second time if he hadn't talked to her about you. When I complained privately to my lord of Mr. Rothsay hanging about the lodge, do you think she turned as pale as ashes, and cried when he passed through the gate, and said good-by?"
She had complained of Rothsay to Lord Lepel--I understood her at last! She knew that my friend and all his family were poor. She had put her own construction on the innocent interest that I had taken in her daughter. Careless of the difference in rank, blind to the malady that was killing me, she was now bent on separating Rothsay and Susan, by throwing the girl into the arms of a rich husband like myself!
"You are wasting your breath," I told her; "I don't believe one word you say to me."
"Believe Susan, then!" cried the reckless woman. "Let me bring her here. If she's too shamefaced to own the truth, look at her--that's all I ask--look at her, and judge for yourself!"
This was intolerable.